U.S. Customs and Border Protection San Diego Field Office officers arrested a driver suspected of trying to smuggle a Mexican national who was concealed in a compartment built into the vehicle’s gas tank at the San Ysidro Port of Entry, it was announced Monday.<\/p>\n
The alleged smuggling attempt occurred at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 27, when CBP officers pulled over a 20-year-old man driving a 2005 GMC SUV. During an initial inspection, a CBP canine team alerted to the vehicle’s undercarriage, according to the agency.<\/p>\n
Border officials said officers drove the vehicle to a secondary inspection area and found a person hidden inside a “non-factory compartment” in the gas tank area. Emergency personnel took the person to Scripps Mercy Hospital in Chula Vista for treatment of burn injuries sustained during the smuggling attempt.<\/p>\n
“This case underscores the dangerous and inhumane tactics employed by smugglers who prioritize profit over human lives,” San Ysidro Port Director Mariza Marin said in a statement. “Thanks to the vigilance and professionalism of U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers, this individual was located and removed from a life-threatening situation, subsequently receiving the medical attention they needed. CBP remains committed to disrupting smuggling operations that endanger the public.”<\/p>\n
The driver, whose name and age have not yet been released, was arrested and booked into the Metropolitan Correctional Center in San Diego<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"U.S. Customs and Border Protection San Diego Field Office officers arrested a driver suspected of trying to smuggle…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":232952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[14,74,76,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-232951","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-immigration","9":"tag-san-diego","10":"tag-san-diego-headlines","11":"tag-san-diego-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}